


Connected, Miles Apart

by carmelitilla



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Missing You, are you thinking of me, siha
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 21:53:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5391701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carmelitilla/pseuds/carmelitilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A drabble in the time when Shepard and Thane are separated by the Alliance without ability to contact each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Connected, Miles Apart

_Siha!_

Shepard wakes with a start, her hair clinging to her forehead in a cold sweat. She sits up, breathing hard. It takes her a moment to remember she’s in her sanctioned Alliance quarters, back on Earth. The rays of early morning stream through the blinds onto the minimalist desk slanted against the corner of the room, stacked data pads humming quietly upon it beside her haphazardly forgotten gun belt.

 

It’s the forth night in a row she’s dreamed of Thane. She pushes her hair back, pulling at her scalp. She’d known when they’d sworn themselves to each other that she wouldn’t have much time with him, but she hadn’t thought it would be _so_ short. Now, trapped in her gilded cage, she worries about him constantly, wondering if he’s alive out there in the universe that’s also been taken from her. She worries that she’s failed him, that Kepler’s Syndrome has taken him while she’s been away, like she might have been able to physically fight the drell disease for him.

 

The nightmares are different, but they always end the same. She’s holding him in her arms that night before the Omega Four Mass Relay, but his vibrant green parlour has paled, and his eyes are grey with sickness. He starts coughing. She can’t calm him. Alliance soldiers storm into the captian’s quarters and drag her away from him – and then his voice shouts, the same key as when they dragged her away from him on the Citadel. It had happened so quickly.

 

_Grunt jumps off the shuttle before it’s settled against the cool metal of the docking bay. He’s excited, he’s been running around the mess recounting the battle with the Collectors to anyone who will listen, most of whom were there – but that doesn’t stop him. He held the line with hundreds, nay, thousands of ghouls running towards them, but none would get through to his Battlemaster. Bang, bang, bang, CHARGE!_

_Oh, Grunt, Tali hushes him half-heartedly. She waves to Liara whose waiting across the bridge, both of them having promised some R &R if they made it back alive. _

 

_Garrus steps off with Shepard, smiling in that turian way. She looks back for Thane but he’s disappeared, slinking off into the shadows in one of the many games they play. Jacob and Zaeed bring up the rear, anxious to get out for a now-or-never kind of party._

_I can’t believe we did it, Shepard, Garrus says, but then he stops abruptly, raising his arm in front of her. Her crew forms up around her, she can’t see around them, but she can hear the precise stomp of standard army treads thudding over the bridge._

_What’s this about, Tali asks, and then Liara is arguing. You can’t do this, she says. Shepard is a hero._

_Commander Shepard, calls a guilty voice - it hits Shepard like a knife, right in the back, it’s Udina._

_How many, Shepard asks Garrus._

_Two dozen, we can take them –_

_Siha. Thane appears behind her. They’ve come to take you._

_They can’t, she’s saying, her eyes are fearful as she looks at him. Not yet._

_Thane knows what’s going to happen moments before it does. He grabs Shepard by the hips and dives as chaos ignites on the bridge. The krogan pulls his rifle from his back, and like dominos the others loyal to Shepard do the same. The quarian drops as Thane shoulders Shepard up and throws her behind a set of crates, hit by a stunning shot._

_What the hell is going on!? Shepard shouts as the turian comes around the other side of their make-shift cover. She pokes her head up to observe the field, than ducks into his shoulder as a volley of shots sail overhead. He smells the fresh scent of her shampoo and the distinct salt of her human skin._

_There’s a warrant out for your arrest, Shepard, the turian curses taloning his omni-tool. As a Cerberus terrorist, he says firing a blind volley with his gun over the crates,_

_Udina you son of a bitch! Shepard yells. Thane sees her wrath release through her blood, coiling the warrior inside her, her eyes turn to cold fury._

_This can be easy or this can be difficult, Shepard. Either way, you’re a wanted criminal!_

_God damnit, I just got back from saving your ass! Humanity's ass!_

_You’re a murderer Shepard, and a terrorist, surrender peacefully._

_Shepard shoves out for their cover and fires a series of shots in quick succession. She uses a human curse Thane doesn’t understand._

_What do you want to do, Shepard? The Normandy’s likely grounded, the turian says – and then a flash, so harsh it blinds Thane, knocking the three of them away from the crates. Alliance soldiers converge on them, he stands, sweeping the legs out from under the first, punching the second in the stomach, his hands are weapons moving like he breathes._

_Thane!_

 

_Thane sees Shepard throwing her weight in vain away from the soldiers who have taken her arms. She shouts his name. The body of the turian is at her feet, knocked out. Her energy is a wild thing, thrashing against the human men._

_Thane shouts to her, but there are more soldiers to replace the ones he’s downed. He can’t get through them._

 

_Siha!_

Thane wakes, throwing the ebony coverlet off of himself. He’s in Kolyat’s apartment, in the dark quiet of the spare bedroom. It’s the forth time he’s woken from the memory this week – the 71st since Shepard was captured by the Alliance. He rubs a hand over his face, frustrated by his inability to change this. She had sent word with Garrus that he should flee, take a false name, that the humans would come looking for him. When he had disagreed, the turian had reminded him gently that it was what she wanted, that she had agreed before they met to return to the Alliance to stand trial for her alleged crimes - after her mission. Thane takes a shuttering breath. He worries that he’s failed her. Nothing is worse than the torture of her absence. He wonders where she is now, what time it is on Earth - is she thinking of him? He can't seem to stop thinking about her. 


End file.
